January 15 Letters: Evans and football’s moral maze

IT seems to me that there are only two certainties arising from the Ched Evans rape case. A young woman’s life and a young footballer’s career have been ruined. The victim is constantly having to change her identity to keep ahead of the mob and in the increasingly unlikely event of the perpetrator resuming his career he will be mercilessly vilified at every football stadium.

If there is any good to come out of this awful mess it is that young men and young women everywhere may become aware that drunken nights out can cause irreparable damage.

From: David Rimington, Fairways Drive, Harrogate.

THE Ched Evans case has raised very strong feelings, mainly by those who oppose his return to football.

The thing that amazes me, and many others I am sure, is the way in which his girlfriend Natasha Massey, and her father have stood by and supported Ched Evans. Love is blind they say.

We also should look at other criminals who were allowed back into football.

Perhaps the worst case is that of Lee Hughes who drove his car whilst drunk, hit another car, killed the driver and then left the scene. This criminal killer was signed by Oldham Athletic upon his release from prison.

Luke McCormick, in a similar drink-drive crime, killed two brothers, and was signed by Plymouth Argyle.

The one-time England international Graham Rix was convicted of sex with a 15-year-old girl, and later returned to football. So is Evans’s crime worse than these?

Political battle ahead

From: Nigel Adams MP, Member of Parliament for Selby and Ainsty, York.

I WAS intrigued to read the article by Martin Deane of the Yorkshire Green Party (The Yorkshire Post, January 12). Mr Deane states that the Greens want to build a society based on “hope not fear”. Ironically, every paragraph was aimed at spreading fear on issues from this government being “devoted to causing poverty” to “excess winter deaths”.

I am afraid that the Greens’ message reads just like the usual Labour Party scare tactics based on spreading fear and envy. If that is how the Greens spread “hope”, then I wonder what their version of negative campaigning looks like?

From: ME Wright, Harrogate.

LIKE John Bolton (The Yorkshire Post, January 12), I am dreading 20 weeks of political ear-bashing.

I like his idea of “Jehovah’s Witnesses Welcome” but wonder if seeking temporary refuge in a monastery might prove less challenging, both politically and philosophically. What about finding some way of dragooning the politicians into one, then we could all enjoy some relative sanity?

From: Jeffrey Shaw, Sheffield.

MANY of my associates are attracted to Ukip policies (including on immigration).

However, they’re confused – deliberately – by Ukip’s opponents who claim that the party is xenophobic. But, you see, Ukip has no negative feelings whatsoever to current immigrants if lawfully in the UK and law-abiding.

It merely highlights the downside of further immigration. Its opponents can’t tell the difference between immigrants and immigration – but most voters can, and so can Amjad Bashir, a Yorkshire Ukip MEP!

From: Anna Semlyen, York.

Former Lord Mayor and Micklegate Councillor Julie Gunnell would make an excellent choice as Labour’s candidate to replace Hugh Bayley as York’s MP.

Labour HQ asked for an all women shortlist. As Mayor, Julie hugely raised the profile and funding of local domestic abuse charity IDAS. She led on York winning White Ribbon status – an award for highlighting domestic violence. Her credentials stack up.

Julie is York born and bred, knows local politics and how to represent people. Her style is personable and friendly.

Realities of Waterloo

From: Hugh Rogers, Ashby, Scunthorpe.

CHRISTINE Dabbs is lucky (The Yorkshire Post, January 12). The experiences of her relative, the young and inexperienced guardsman Matthew Clay, are well documented in Waterloo: A Near Run Thing by David Howarth.

He was at Hougoumont – a small chateau (not a farm) on the right of the Allied line. Like the majority of ordinary foot soldiers at Waterloo, he spent most of his time cold, wet and hungry, firing his musket at the French and trying to eat part of a (mostly) raw pig’s head.

Isn’t history fascinating?

Taking on the extremists

From: Hilary Andrews, Leeds.

WE have not seen universal condemnation of the French terrorism attacks by imams and I feel they should be helping in our country’s fight against bloodshed by loudly denouncing the radicals in their community at every opportunity.

From: Allan Davies, Grimsby.

IAN Morris (The Yorkshire Post, January 12) quotes the almost repeated lines in the Koran: “Allah hears all and sees all.”

It sounds just like the beginning of the “Yorkshireman’s Bible”.